A Cultural Comment on the New Yorker website, June 22, 2018.
Wagnerism
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Miscellany
On June 24, the New Opera Days Ostrava festival will give the belated world premiere of Thy Kingdom Come, by the pioneering Czech microtonal composer Alois Hába. Completed in 1942, the work draws inspiration from the Anthroposophical writings of Rudolf Steiner, intermingling mystical and socialist themes; Act II features a colloquy among Christ, Ariman, and Lucifer. The program also includes Salvatore Sciarrino’s Luci mie traditrici, new pieces by Daniel Ting-Cheung Lo and Rudolf Komorous, and a rendition of Julius Eastman's graphic score Macle.... Eamonn Quinn, the director of the Louth Contemporary Music Society in Ireland, has won the Belmont Prize for Contemporary Music. He will receive the prize at the outset of Louth's Book of Hours festival (June 22-23), which will include new works by Sciarrino, Michael Pisaro, Rebecca Saunders, and Karen Tanaka.... Earlier this season I wrote about Augustin Hadelich's striking performances of the Britten Violin Concerto with the Detroit Symphony. Marc Geelhoed, the ace director of Detroit's pioneering free webcasts, informs me that the video is online.... I wrote about last year's solstice celebrations at The Tank, in Rangely, Colorado. This year's edition includes performances by Ryan Ruehlen and Ron Miles.... Also on the solstice, Make Music NY will offer its usual welter of sounds, including Mass Appeal concerts for banjos, buckets, French horns, guitars, harmonicas, mandolins, and ukuleles.... Ethan Iverson and Miranda Cuckson perform a striking program at Spectrum in NYC on June 24: music of Louise Talma, George Walker, Martino, the ubiquitous Sciarrino, and Josiah Catalan.... Ethan wrote a beautiful memorial to the great Lorraine Gordon, grande dame of the Village Vanguard.... Read Joshua Kosman and Lisa Hirsch on the latest iteration of the San Francisco Opera's Ring. I caught the Götterdämmerung, and was gripped throughout. I may have heard some parts better sung, but I've never seen the work acted with such verve and invention; Daniel Brenna's Siegfried was especially impressive in this regard.
